


Chronoskimming for Dummies

by OddLittleSpider



Category: The Umbrella Academy (Comics), The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Childhood Memories, Childhood Trauma, Complicated Relationships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Minor Swearing, Platonic Relationships, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-13 19:14:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29283582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OddLittleSpider/pseuds/OddLittleSpider
Summary: 58 year old Five can spatial jump, time travel, and chronoskim - that is the ability to transfer his consciousness to past or future versions of himself. So when the apocalypse begins, he chronoskims back to the glory days of the Academy, back before his disappearance. But Five finds taking control of his 13 year old mind and hijacking his body is a lot harder than he thought.
Relationships: Number Five | The Boy & Vanya Hargreeves, Number Five | The Boy/Vanya Hargreeves
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

>   
> I have decided to take a few liberties with this story.  
> One, the children will not call Reginald ‘Father.’ In the comics, Reginald had them call him The Monocle. Personally, I think Sir Reginald is more fitting.  
> Two, the children do not see each other as siblings and will not be referring to each other as siblings.  
> Three, Reginald assigned seven nannies to behave as a mother to each of the seven children. They also take the last name of their respective “mother.” For example, Grace Smirnov is mother to Number Seven, Vanya Smirnov.  
> In summary, they are adopted by an eccentric billionaire and trained to become a crime fighting team (with the exception of Number Seven). The children do not call Reginald father and are raised by different nannies/mothers.

_It had been 365 days since he found himself stuck in the apocalypse. In layman’s terms, it had been approximately one year._

_His sallow skin clung tightly against his bones. His dark brown hair had grown knotted and long. His clothes were torn and filthy._

_He was wasting away. And a part of him didn’t care._

_He wasn’t getting out of here alive. He was already a dead man walking. Any moment now, he would close his eyes, the cell doors would open and he would be led to the place of execution._

_Fire up the electric chair, he thought, with a bitter chuckle, I’m already in hell._

_He caught sight of his reflection from a broken mirror. He placed a gloved hand against the cool surface, wiping away the rest of the frost. It greeted him with a visage of disappointment, its thin blue lips formed in a permanent frown._

_“Fuck you, too,” Five said._

_Flash._

Five blinked and stared at the food on his plate like it was some sort of animal. He looked up and saw Sir Reginald and the other children around him, eating dinner silently. An audio recording played in the background, detailing how to properly take care of a gunshot wound.

It all came back to Five. He was eating dinner. It was dinner time. Today was Wednesday – which meant the home chief had prepared his favorite meal: a medium rare steak with a side of mashed potatoes and peas.

Five usually looked forward to Wednesdays. But, for the past three weeks, he had been victim to spontaneous flashes of memories he had never experienced. These flashes often touched upon one of his five senses and usually came along with uncomfortable, sometimes, painful symptoms. They were the stuff of nightmares, most of them horrific and unsettling.

And they came at their peak during Wednesday afternoons.

He would have breathed a sigh of relief if he had known it would be over. But his tormentor had just cracked the whip.

Five stiffed, bracing himself as his skin crawled, his hair stood upright, and his temperature plunged. It was the summer, yet he felt as if he were in the dead of winter.

His eyes flickered to Reginald, dabbing his lips with a napkin. He fought off the urge to violently shiver by digging his fingernails into his hands. It wasn’t the best solution but it was better than storming upstairs to his bed and wrapping himself in his blankets. When the symptoms had passed, he breathed deeply in relief and dug a spoon into his mashed potatoes. Chewing slowly, he lifted his eyes.

The other children and Reginald didn’t seem to have noticed. They just kept their heads low, chewing quietly. And he was relieved.

He was certain he had perfected a hidden art, until he noticed someone’s eyes on him.

It was Vanya, situated at the far end of the table. She watched him with curious, concerned eyes.

Ah, Vanya. She was a mystery to him, as she was to the other children. She rarely spoke and often isolated herself in her room. And yet, she knew when something was wrong. She could read her music just as well as she could read his soul. This gift of hers often fascinated him. But, sometimes, it unnerved him. And today, he certainly felt like a frog being dissected by her eyes. 

He gulped down the mashed potatoes. When he was sure Reginald wasn’t looking, he turned his head in her direction, gave her one of his tight-lipped smiles, and stuck out his tongue.

She smiled sheepishly and fiddled with a stray pea on her plate, poking it with her fork. She knew he was teasing her for staring at him for so long, but it was hard not to.

Five just…looked off.

It wasn’t the first time she caught him staring off into the distance. Nor was it the first time when she saw the glimmer in his eyes return, it was as if he had awakened from a dream or nightmare.

It was often a nightmare.

She could tell. His eyes would widen in horror and his skin would grow pale. She had never seen Five afraid. Even when the odds were against them, he never believed they were ever against _him_. He was cocky, powerful, and gave witty one-liners that ranked him favorite among the general public. At least that was what she read in _Cosmopolitan_ magazine, conveniently found tossed in a trash bin (she assumed by Alison).

But whatever it was, if it made someone as strong as Five turn paler than drywall then it would probably be the death of a timid, meek thing like her. His fear was her fear. And the uncertainty plagued her. It seeped into her violin lessons, causing her to let loose broken notes. It crawled in the surface of her brain and leaped into her dreams, turning them into nightmares.

She had to know. Five was afraid. Of what? She was too shy to ask and he was too proud to tell.

She sighed. It was all too much. She didn’t want to be burdened with his troubles anymore. Her sickness was already too much for her to handle.

She pulled out a small little bottle from her pocket, popped a pill onto her tongue, and chugged it down with a half-empty glass of water. She looked up, hoping no one had seen her, only to meet Five’s bewildered eyes. Her face flushed red and immediately, she looked down, tugging at an strand of her hair. She always made sure to take her pills when no one was looking. And she hadn’t known he was watching.

She returned to poking her food with her fork. But she still felt his eyes on her. She wanted to _fold_ into herself, if such a thing was possible.

It was kind of ironic. The observer was now the observed.

Five quickly looked around to see if anyone had noticed him. Alison and Luther were too busy playing footsies with each other. Klaus was trying to make Ben laugh by putting peas into his nose. Diego was sharpening his knives underneath the table. Five suppressed a chuckle. The old man hadn’t noticed a thing.

Five took the moment to think. When Five had asked Vanya’s nanny, Grace, she told him that Vanya took three pills a day – early morning, mid afternoon, and late at night. They ate dinner at approximately 6:00 PM, so Vanya had taken a pill a few hours before the sun had completely set, ahead of her designated schedule…

And to think of it, Five had seen her late this morning in the gym. She was watching them train with that miserable look she always wore. He saw her pull a bottle out of her pocket and hide behind a column for a moment. She would then step back into focus, shoving the bottle inconspicuously into her pocket. Five didn’t think much of it then. He was too distracted trying to beat Luther and Diego in a push-up competition.

But now he couldn’t believe it. How many times had she done that? Did Pogo know? Did anyone know? That Vanya was popping pills like they were candy?!

A pang of dread crawled through his belly.

He didn’t know Vanya at all. He really didn’t.

He imagined her lying on a hospital bed, doctors scrambling to resuscitate her. One of them would approach Reginald and the children, proclaiming that they had done everything they could. Reginald would be furious, as if they had failed to repair a broken toy from his prized collection. Alison would be weeping the loudest, putting on a theatrical display of despair. Luther would take the opportunity to wrap Alison into his arms, lamenting, “If only we had seen the signs.” Klaus would be too high to know what the heck was happening. Ben would be busy trying to get Klaus to snap back to reality. Diego would insist her death was no accident and flee, tracking down some thugs to beat up. Meanwhile, Five would be forced to stare down at her cold and lifeless eyes, haunted by the knowledge of who the real killer was.

This sad, almost comical hypothetical scenario was enough to make him lose his appetite. He placed his spoon beside his plate.

He couldn’t wait until they were dismissed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you enjoyed the story, please leave a kudos and/or comment! I greatly appreciate all of your feedback.


	2. Chapter 2

Sir Reginald looked at his watch. “Time is up! You are all dismissed.”

The children got up from their seats and left the room quietly. Immediately, the servants came onto the scene, collecting the dishes and sweeping up the floor.

Luther, Alison, Klaus, and Vanya waited at the staircase. Sir Reginald passed by them and went up the stairs. When he was out of sight, Alison said, “It’s not fair. Five can just spatial jump to his room while the rest of us have to wait here until Monocle passes.” The Monocle, it was a name the children called him behind his back. Klaus had thought of it and he beamed whenever they used it.

“If all of us flooded the staircase, there would be no way for him to get through,” Luther said.

“Shut up, kiss -up,” Diego said.

“What?” Luther said, with a grin, “I’m right.”

Diego scoffed and scrambled up the staircase.

“Hey, I go first! Number One, remember?” Luther said, running up after him. Allison rolled her eyes, muttering something about being the mature one. She soon followed, with Ben and Klaus running past her and giggling. Vanya looked up, quietly waited at the bottom, until she could no longer hear their footsteps. Then she went up. She had perfected the art of walking soundlessly across the wooden flooring. And with her oxford leather shoes? Quite the challenge. It was such a little thing she prided herself on. But she never wanted the others to hear the tapping of her shoes and know she had been waiting. She didn’t want them to feel guilty.

If they ever felt guilty.

As she walked down the hallway, the walls felt like they were closing in around her. The pills always made her feel so dizzy.

Suddenly a door creaked open from the side of the hallway. A blonde woman, dressed like a 1950s housewife, was holding a basket of freshly laundered clothes. It was Grace, Vanya’s mother. All of the children had been raised by nannies Reginald had hired to act as mothers. These women raised them, cleaned after them, and named them – they even took the last name of their respective “mother.”

“Vanya!” she said, in delight. But her expression changed to concern when she caught sight of Vanya’s pale face, “Vanya, are you alright?”

Vanya recovered. “Yes, I’m fine. Thanks, Mom.” She reached out and took the basket from Grace’s hands.

Grace gave her a puzzled look. “Anything I can do? Does your room need cleaning?”

“No, I’m fine.”

Grace smiled. She leaned forward, her manicured fingers squeezing Vanya’s arm playfully.

“If you say so!”

Vanya smiled back, but it looked more like a grimace. If there was one person in the world she truly loved and didn’t want to burden with her problems – it was Grace.

“You know where to find me if you need me,” she said with a wink. She then twirled on her heel and walked away with the gracefulness of a ballerina.

Vanya watched her disappear from view. She stood in front of her bedroom door, grasping the doorknob. She gently twisted it open and pushed back the door so it wouldn’t creak loudly. When the door shut behind her, she closed her eyes and sighed. Finally, she was alone.

She opened her eyes.

Five sitting on her bed.

She jumped, dropping the laundry basket onto the floor. She held back a scream.

“Hey, Vanya,” he said, nonchalantly.

“Hey, Five,” she said, weakly, “What are you –”

“You’re worst than Klaus.” He pulled out one of her medication bottles.

“How did you – ” She looked to an open drawer on her bed stand. He pulled out the entire drawer, dumping its contents onto her bed. Orange bottles filled with medication landed soundlessly onto the sheets.

“You should become a dealer, Vanya,” Five said, with that tight-lipped smile of his.

Vanya stared at him, confused and surprised. She felt sick. She was tempted to reach into her pocket for her medication. Instead, she glared at him, biting down her rising humiliation.

“I-I’m not like Klaus. I need this for my health.”

“Yeah, I hear that all the time from the medium himself. He ‘needs’ it so the undead can quit haunting him.”

Vanya walked over to the bed. She grabbed the bottles and stuffed them back into the drawer. She muttered, “You didn’t have to make a mess.”

Five grabbed her wrist with a python-like grasp.

She winced. 

“Vanya, answer,” he said, sharply. 

Vanya glared at him with a look that could burn flesh. He nearly flinched. But Five never flinched. Especially not for someone as harmless as Vanya. Harmless? Why did that feel like such an unnatural thought?

 _Harmless?_ The thought crept into his mind.

Strange...it did not feel like his own. 

Five looked at Vanya's face and noticed something extraordinary. Her face took on a startling transformation.

She grew radiant, her skin became as white as ivory.

Five was transfixed. He couldn't look away, although a part of him pleaded to try. He was utterly helpless. Like a moth to a flame.

He was compelled to release her wrist from his grasp. 

She looked...no, she was _beautiful_. 

But it must have been a trick of his imagination. For as quickly as it came, it disappeared. Her eyes, once dark and defiant, were now watery and sad. She looked away, but it was too late. He had already seen their expression. 

“Why do you care?” she said, bitterly. 

Five blinked. He hadn’t expected that. He was truly lost for words. Why did he care?

Five shook his head, deciding to change the subject altogether. “Grace told me you take three pills a day, according to your medication. Today, you’ve taken far more than three. “

Vanya was silent. So someone had noticed. And that person happened to be Five. Arrogant, conceited Five. A part of her was relieved. But another part cried out in horror. 

Five motioned her to sit beside him on her bed. The coils cried out, heightening her anxiety, and making this all terribly awkward.

Without thinking, she blurted out, “I’m very sick!”

Five gave her a skeptical look. “You look healthy to me.”

She shook her head. “No,” she hesitated then continued, “I’m sick in the mind, Five.”

Five looked at her, the words dawning on him.

_Sick in the mind._

He had figured that was what the pills were for. Some sort of mental illness. But what for? Bipolar? Schizophrenia? Depression? Social anxiety?

Why did it suddenly matter to him now? He was a busy man. He had mathematical equations to solve. He was _this_ close to unearthing the secret equation to time travel and getting his ultimate revenge by proving that old fart wrong. He should leave, he really should.

But something kept him glued to that bed – guilt, obligation, perhaps even a sliver of compassion?

Vanya released a tremendous sigh. She was certain what she would say next would drive Five away from her forever. But she was itching for someone to confide to.

“I’ve never told anyone this. Not even Mom. But sometimes…three pills a day isn’t enough. If I get really upset, bad things happen,” she said, in a hushed tone and a haunted look in her eyes, “The sickness takes over. It’s like I lose myself.”

Five rose an eyebrow, suddenly very interested.

She looked at her hands. “Do you remember when Reginald was on some business trip and you all snuck out to Griddy’s?”

There was bitterness in her voice. Five nodded, averting his eyes.

Her lip quivered. “I was left all alone. I felt so bad. I wanted to die. I could feel the sickness crawling up inside me. I got so tired of it; I guzzled down a whole bottle of pills. When I realized what I had done, the sickness only got worst!”

Five met her watery eyes. His heart swelled. Tears streamed down her flushed face.

Five felt a pang of guilt. On that day, he had thought about Vanya but he _assumed_ she didn’t want to go. He didn’t even bother to ask. He hadn’t even brought her back a doughnut. 

He placed a hand on her shoulder. He knew it wouldn’t help but he didn’t know what else to do.

“Vanya, I – “

“I felt the sickness take over. Mom heard me screaming and came in to calm me down but,” Vanya bit her lip, “I fell unconscious and woke up hours later with a major migraine. Everything in my room was destroyed. The windows were shattered, the wallpaper torn, and all of my stuff had been tossed and broken. I didn’t know how, but I knew I had done it. Pogo was there, standing by the door. I asked him where Mom was, he told me she was downstairs getting stitches.”

The tears in Vanya’s eyes ran fuller and faster down her pink face.

“I hurt her, Five. I hurt my own mother and I couldn’t even remember how. But Pogo,” she smiled sadly, “He told me Mom was going to be okay. We went down to the infirmary and I asked Mom to show me the stitches. They were horribly large gashes, sewn together with surgical thread,” Vanya ran her fingers across her own arms, showing Five where the gashes had been.

“I couldn’t believe what I had done. It was…as if I intended to kill her,” Vanya trembled, “But Mom, you know how she is, she was so kind and so strong. She didn’t look like she was in any pain. I thought this time I’d see her get angry or upset but she reacted like she always did.”

Vanya looked at her hands. “I don’t deserve her.”

She wiped her tears. She wondered if she was being too loud. She self-consciously looked to the door. She looked back at Five and spoke again, this time more quietly,

“Pogo suggested we take a walk while Mom recovered. We strolled around the manor gardens and I told him everything I was feeling. I didn’t have to tell him you all snuck out, he already knew.”

Five reeled. Pogo had known? And he chose not to tell Reginald?

Vanya nodded, as if she knew what he was thinking.

“You all think of Pogo as nothing more than Reginald’s right hand servant. If you all took the time to know him, as he did to me on that day…I think you would like what you see,” she said, her voice taking on an airy, dreamy tone. She hunched her back and bent her head forward, so her long hair fell and concealed her face.

Five looked at her, his expression softening.

“But the whole thing really haunts me, I couldn’t even remember a thing.” She pressed a hand to her forehead. “Maybe it was a hallucination. I hallucinate all sorts of things. One time,” she said with a bitter laugh, “I imagined a burst of white energy coming from my chest, sort of like Ben’s tentacles, suspending all of you in the air. Luther, Klaus, Diego – they all looked so old. But you, you looked exactly the same. You were all in pain. You were all dying. And I was growing more powerful. But the worst part,” she leaned close, a dark, indescribable look in her eyes,

“I liked it.”

Five’s blood ran cold.

_How did she know? How did she know?!_

Wait, what was it that she knew? It was just a hallucination, nothing more than a dream. Then why was he in so much pain?

He skin felt like it was burning. He was _hot, hot, hot_. Damn it, why?! Was he in Hell? He bent over, wrapping an arm around his stomach. He felt like he was going to puke. 

“Five?!”

He winced. Even the sound of her voice couldn’t put him at ease.

 _Relax, it’ll pass. Just stay cool_ , he thought to himself.

“It’s happening now, isn’t it?” She looked at him in terror, her fingers reaching out to comfort him. But he let out a cry, forcing her to draw back.

Something flashed before Five’s eyes.

He wanted to scream. _Not now_ , he thought, _definitely not now._

_“Now!”_

_Five and the others all dashed at the glowing white figure. There was no way she could fight off all of them. One of them would apprehend her, tossing her to the ground, and successfully separate her from her source of power: the violin._

_But they didn’t know. They really didn’t know her at all._

_The glowing figure let loose a surge of blinding white light. Five threw his hands in front of him. Abort plan, abort plan, he thought. But it was too late. Before his mind could even register a spatial jump, Five and the others were lifted into the air by tendrils of glowing hot energy. Five grasped at his throat. He was choking. Vanya was choking the life out of them. He couldn’t summon the ability to jump, she was sapping his entire body of strength. He looked at Vanya with pleading eyes. Did she know what she was doing?!_

_But Vanya was nowhere to be seen. It was White Violin. She drove her bow against the strings of her violin, playing the very song of her soul: high pitched and melancholy. And she looked through him with the eyes of a cold, callous god._

_The white energy surging through him hurt like hot iron against flesh. Memories flashed through him. Vanya in anguish. Vanya in pain. Vanya alone. These didn’t belong to him. She was directing them all at him and the others._

_“Where were you all these years?” The voice spoke into his thoughts. It was deep and muddled and it sounded like Vanya’s._

_“Vanya! Damn it! Please, stop this!” Five said to her in his mind._

_White Violin now turned her rage to Luther. Five could hear her speak to him, but it was as if he was listening behind a closed door._

_“Thought you could lock me up? How does it feel to be the one in a cage?”_

_She then directed her attention to Diego but Five was distracted by the sight of a figure stealthy approaching behind Vanya._

_Allison!_

_Five nearly wept at the sight of her. She was their backup plan._

_Allison held the gun, pointing it behind Vanya’s head._

_Five felt his heart gave out. He was ashamed to say that this was part of the plan. But what other option was there? White Violin was sapping the very life out of them. And soon the world would follow…_

_But then White Violin looked directly at Five. Her tendrils seeped into his mind, probing into every thought. No, no…_

_Allison fired. Five braced himself for a loud, thunderous boom which would be amplified by Violin’s sound waves._

_Five heard nothing._

_White Violin was still standing, completely unharmed._

_She missed? How did she –_

_He realized Allison did not intend to kill her. It was just like they read in Sir Reginald’s journal: White Violin had the power to convert sound into energy which relied on Vanya’s ability to hear. Allison had intended to disrupt her sound waves with a single shot near the ear, quite possibly leaving her deaf._

_But the gun had not made a sound. It had been engulfed in white light before Allison had even let loose a bullet._

_She knew._

_White Violin had read his mind._

_She didn’t have enough time to stop Allison from pulling the trigger so she had used her power to engulf the gun in a sound barrier made of light. But in order to do so, White Violin had to loosen her grip on Five’s neck. But Five couldn’t struggle free, her powerful hold on him remained._

_He looked at the others from the side of his eyes. Luther wasn’t moving. Diego was still. Klaus had stopped kicking. They were telepathically and empathically connected through Violin’s power. He had heard their screaming thoughts. So when they were silenced, he could sense they were gone._

_They were dead._

_Five sobbed bitterly. Everything he had done, surviving the apocalypse, joining the Commission, scouring the city for a prosthetic eye...all of it would have meant something if he had succeeded in stopping the apocalypse. If he had saved his friends._

_But it had all been for nothing. That was the cold hard truth._

_His body and mind too was giving out. It was at a slower pace than the others, but the outcome would be the same. So many times he thought he had faced the end of his life only to escape despite all the odds. But there was no way he was getting out of this one alive._

_He closed his eyes and spoke into White Violin’s thoughts, perhaps he could reach Vanya with a few parting words._

_“Goodbye, Vanya. I wish I had gotten to know you a little better.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know things are a bit confusing now, but they will make sense once you read the next chapter.  
> Also, if it isn't already obvious, White Violin is Vanya's alter ego. She only comes out when Vanya feels threatened or vulnerable. 
> 
> If you enjoyed the story, please leave a kudos and/or comment! I greatly appreciate all of your feedback.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the first chapter, 13 year old Five was experiencing strange flashes of memories he's never experienced before. This has been going on for several days without improvement. Five, ever the warrior, is reluctant to tell anyone. But someone has noticed. 
> 
> In the second chapter, 13 year old Five is compelled (for a reason he doesn't quite understand) to help Vanya with her addiction to her medication. But, when Vanya reveals to Five about a certain (eerily familiar) "hallucination" she's been having, the revelation forces him into another episode. In this one, he experiences a memory exactly as the one Vanya had predicted. 
> 
> In this third chapter, we return to the year, 2019, where 58 year old Five (in his 13 year old body) is currently trying to struggle free from the grip of Vanya's alter ego, White Violin.

_Goodbye, Vanya. I wish I had gotten to know you a little better._

Five closed his eyes.

It had all been for nothing

It was easier just to fade. To give in.

And yet, a part of him fought back against the thought. It struggled and broke free and spread its wings to the sky. Its wings were broken and tattered yet it flew. It looked down from above, glowering at him, “Is this really all you’ve got?”

Five smirked.

For the second time, White Violin looked directly at him. A glimmer passed in her eyes. She knew what he was thinking. He knew she didn’t think he could do it. He could feel her doubt squirming around in his brain.

He had done it once. He believed he could only do it once. But now was no time for doubt.

When he had first implemented the equation, he had succeeded in transporting his 58 year old consciousness into his 13 year old body yet landed only seven days before the apocalypse. The equation wasn’t perfect. This time he had to get it right. He had to make sure his consciousness landed in the right body _and_ the right time.

The music reached a glittering crescendo. White Violin shone as bright as the sun. His heart was hammering in his chest. His soul was slipping.

_Focus, focus._

He imagined the equation in his head, the same one he had used. He switched around some numbers. He was certain this equation was correct. But he had to be sure. And so, for the first time, he implemented another far more complex equation beside it, one which allowed him to _see_ into the past and destination.

_He was lying in a bed, a man stood above him, peering at him from a pair of scrutinizing blue eyes – one of which was concealed by a monocle. Five felt his tiny hands reach out._

Five gasped. He was close. So close. He switched the numbers around again to form a different series of coordinates.

_He scoured the colossal wreck of a boundless and bare civilization in the hope of finding canned food. There, amongst the rubble, was a glittering silver cylinder. His heart leaped in delight. He managed to break it open. The stench of sickly sweet botulism made him curl his lip in disgust. His stomach growled. Was it worth the risk? He closed his eyes and chucked the thing as far as he could before he could succumb to its temptations. He collapsed, let out a bloodcurdling scream, and beat his fists on the ground like a zoo ape against laminated glass. Then he got back up and foraged for hours, through piles of debris once again._

Five let out a hysterical cry. No, not that again! He would rather die than experience it all over again.

 _Stay calm._ He took a deep breath.

_“Focus, Number Five!” Reginald said, tapping at his monocle._

_Five clenched his teeth. Blue energy swirled around his closed fists._

_“Don’t you want to improve? Don’t you want to grow stronger? Your spatial jumps are erratic and spontaneous. One minute, you’re sitting on that chair and the next you’re staring in from out that window. Implement the equation correctly, Number Five! Your destination should be from your current position to the chosen next!”_

_The equations swirled around in Five’s 13 year old brain. It was simple, really. Spatial jump from the current chair he was sitting on, onto the chair beside him. But Five had never spatial jumped directly to his destination, he had always landed either a couple of feet or mere inches from his target._

_“Why does it matter? Three feet or three inches?” Five said, snapping at the old man. He knew he was asking a stupid question but he wanted brittle bones to get fed up and let him rest. All this nonstop spatial jumping was making him lose his mind._

_“Believe me, Five,” Reginald had said, leaning forward and glowering at him from beneath scrutinizing brows, “It would make all the difference.”_

_If he wanted to succeed, he had to clear his mind of any distractions. He hated to admit it but the old fart wasn’t just trying to provoke him. He was right. He had to focus. But it had been eight hours without breaks. His empty stomach growled and his eyelids threatened to lock shut over his bloodshot eyes –_

_“Focus!” Reginald said, beating his cane against the wooden floorboards._

_Five glared. After all this was over, he’d find a way to get back at the old bag of bones. But now, he figured, was not the time to plot revenge._

_He closed his eyes. The numbers clicked and locked into place. He imagined the chair beside him and, as the formula in his mind went to work, he whispered to his thoughts: Take me there._

Five grinned. Bingo.

Suddenly his heart rate plunged and his whole body convulsed. He gasped desperately for air.

_Reginald leaned forward in his chair again. From the look on his face, Five could tell that he was near the edge of success._

_Reginald grasped his cane tightly and swung it in the air. "Come on! You're nearly there! That's it, Number Five! That's it!"_

_The blue energy fizzled and sparkled, frantic with excitement._

_"Implement the equation! Do it! Do it, now!"_

Five clenched his fists, closed his eyes, and his body vibrated with blue energy.

After a few moments, his body went limp, nothing but an empty husk.

The glowing white figure smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, this chapter is a bit shorter than usual.


End file.
